• Habitats are defined by chapter, allowing you speedy access to detailed habitat-specific information
• More than 60 tables allow rapid access to precise data
• 104 illustrations provide instant visualization of complex data sets and global trends
• 740 references function as a guide to the related literature

Coastal Ecosystem Processes describes how pelagic and benthic food webs, from beaches and tidal flats to the continental edge, process energy and matter. This volume focuses on recent advances and new developments on how food webs are closely intertwined with the geology, chemistry, and physics of coastal seas. Dr. Alongi presents a process-functional approach as a way of understanding how the energetics of coastal ecosystems rely not only on exchanges within and between food chains, but how such functions are influenced by terrigenous and atmospheric processes.

There is a need for documentation and an awareness of just how necessary, yet delicate, is the interplay of biological and physical forces between coastal ocean, land, and the atmosphere. Marine scientists today need to make informed management decisions about sustainable development and conservation of these fragile ecosystems. Coastal Ecosystem Processes provides present and future marine scientists the latest coastal ecosystem information to make the right decisions concerning the ecology of our oceans.

Contents

1. Introduction
2. Beaches and Tidal Flats
3. Food Chains, Energy, and Carbon Flow
4. Nitrogen Cycling
5. Linkages to Physical Processes
6. Mangroves and Salt Marshes
7. Global Trends in Plant Biomass and Primary Production
8. Factors Limiting Plant Production and Growth
9. Food Webs and Decomposition Processes
10. Nitrogen Flow
11. Outwelling
12. Seaweed and Seagrass Ecosystems
13. Standing Crop and Primary Productivity
14. Photosynthesis and Whole-Plant Carbon Balance
15. Limiting Factors
16. The Role of Grazers
17. Detritus and Mineralization Processes
18. Ecosystem Budgets
19. Carbon Balance: Export and Links to Adjacent Systems
20. Coral Reefs
21. Sources of Carbon Production
22. The Fate of Organic Matter
23. Nitrogen and Phosphorus: Cycles and Limitation
24. The Coral Factory: Carbon and Energy Budgets
25. Systems-Level Perspectives: Models and Budgets
26. The Role of Coral Reefs in the Tropical Biosphere
27. The Coastal Ocean I. The Coastal Zone
28. The Coastal Ocean Defined
29. What Is an Estuary?
30. Hydrographic Classification of Coastal Systems
31. Coastal Plain Estuaries, Tidal Lagoons, and Bays (Types IV, V, and VI)
32. Coastal Lagoons (Type VII)
33. River-Dominated Systems (Types I, II, and III)
34. The Coastal Ocean II. The Shelf Proper and Shelf Edge
35. Shelf-Sea Fronts
36. Along- and Across-Shelf Gradients
37. Processes at the Shelf Edge
38. Nutrient Cycles and Global Change in the Coastal Ocean
39. Global Estimates of Fishery Yields to Humans
40. Degradation and Conservation
41. A Glimpse at the Global Problem
42. Eutrophication
43. Habitat Modification and Destruction
44. Restoration Attempts: Problems and Progress
45. Sustainability: Implications for Management
46. Conservation: Tools and Impediments
47. Global Climate Change: Coastal Implications

Index

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